Coons: A "laughable proposition" from White House lawyers

Sen. Chris Coons: Manafort is “not listening to his lawyers or he's more afraid of the Russians than he is of federal prosecution in the United States.”

“There are recent reports that over the summer the president also reached out to a number of senior Republican senators, chair of the Intelligence Committee, majority leader and others to urge them to wrap up this investigation quickly,” said Coons.

“It suggests an ongoing deeply troubling pattern of personal intervention in an ongoing investigation by the president. And the suggestion today by the president's lawyers that he can't be charged with obstruction of justice, that he can't commit obstruction of justice because he oversees the Department of Justice and the federal law enforcement infrastructure, I think is a laughable proposition. It would mean that the president would be above the law. And one of our core foundational constitutional principles in this country is that no one is above the law.”